yellow

Etymology

Definitions

1. 1

   The color of sunflower petals and lemons

   The color of sunflower petals and lemons; the color obtained by mixing green and red light, or by subtracting blue from white light; the color evoked by light of wavelength around 580 nm; one of the three primary colors in subtractive color systems.

   • It is the strangest yellow, that wall-paper! It makes me think of all the yellow things I ever saw—not beautiful ones like buttercups, but old foul, bad yellow things.
   • Red No. 3, red No. 40, blue No. 2 and green No. 3 all have been linked with cancer or tumors in animals. Other sources say red No. 40 and yellow No. 5 and No. 6 contain or may be contaminated with known carcinogens.
2. 2

   The middle light in a set of three traffic lights, the lighting of which indicates that…

   The middle light in a set of three traffic lights, the lighting of which indicates that drivers should stop short of the intersection if it is safe to do so.

3. 3

   One of the color balls used in snooker, with a value of 2 points.

4. ›+ 17 more definitionsshow fewer

   1. 4

      One of two groups of object balls, or a ball from that group, as used in the principally…

      One of two groups of object balls, or a ball from that group, as used in the principally British version of pool that makes use of unnumbered balls (the yellow(s) and red(s)); contrast stripes and solids in the originally American version with numbered balls).

   2. 5

      A yellow card.

      • Andrew Surman fired in what proved to be a 37th-minute winner before Forest's Paul Konchesky saw red late on. That second yellow for the loan signing came in stoppage time and did not affect the outcome of a game which Norwich dominated.
   3. 6

      Any of various pierid butterflies of the subfamily Coliadinae, especially the yellow…

      Any of various pierid butterflies of the subfamily Coliadinae, especially the yellow colored species. Compare sulphur.

      • Several other beautiful butterflies rewarded my search in this place [...] The most abundant butterflies were the whites and yellows (Pieridae), several of which I had already found at Lombock and at Coupang, while others were new to me.
   4. 7

      Of a yellow hue.

      • He had a yellow laptop in his bag.
      • A sweaty reaper from his tillage brought / First fruits, the green ear and the yellow sheaf.
      • Red o'er the forest glows the setting sun, / The line of yellow light dies fast away / That crown'd the eastern copse, and chill and dun / Falls on the moor the brief November day.
   5. 8

      Lacking courage.

      • What you should be is not yellow at all. If you're supposed to sock somebody in the jaw, and you sort of feel like doing it, you should do it.
      • You yellow bastards! Come back here and take what's coming to you!
   6. 9

      Characterized by sensationalism, lurid content, and doubtful accuracy.

      • The denizens of the gossipy world of the pink press, purple prose and yellow tabloids are shivering over disputed photographs of Princess Caroline of Monaco.
   7. 10

      Of a hue attributed to Far East Asians, especially the Chinese.

      • They were all tall and all handsome, though they varied in their degree of darkness of skin, some being as dark as Mahomed, and some as yellow as a Chinese.
   8. 11

      Far East Asian (relating to Asian people).

      • Imagine that awful being, and you have a mental picture of Dr. Fu-Manchu, the yellow peril incarnate in one man.
      • The two youths, the brown and the yellow, faced each other at the cross-roads, under a dim street-lamp.
   9. 12

      Of mixed Aboriginal and Caucasian ancestry.

      • "Eh, Oscar—you hear about your yeller nephew?".
      • A big full-blood gin cottoned onto me. “Give us a drink, yeller feller.”
   10. 13

       Synonym of high yellow.

       • Charley threw her over for a yellow gal named Nancy: he never forgave Vashti for the vanishing from his life of a menace that had come to mean more to him than Vashti herself.
   11. 14

       Related to the Liberal Democrats.

       • yellow constituencies
   12. 15

       Related to the Free Democratic Party, a political party in Germany.

       • the black–yellow coalition
   13. 16

       To become yellow or yellower.

       • Then suddenly, with the least warning, the sky yellows and the Chergui blows in from the Sahara, stinging the eyes and choking with its sandy, sticky breath.
       • Interviews, clippings, yellowing stories from foreign newspapers, notebooks with old scribblings. Salisbury called it the debris of a reporter always too much on the run to sort out the paper, but there it was, an investigator's dream, […]
   14. 17

       To make (something) yellow or yellower.

   15. 18

       To promote (a captain) to flag rank without command of a squadron, ending his career

       To promote (a captain) to flag rank without command of a squadron, ending his career; to make him a yellow admiral.

       • Then they might yellow him if they wanted to; he would be satisfied with Admiral’s rank.
   16. 19

       Used to indicate that the speaker needs a temporary break from current sexual activity.

   17. 20

       A surname.

The neighborhood

• synonymxantho-light wavelengths
• synonymblond
• synonymcream
• synonymdandelion
• synonymgold
• synonymkhaki
• synonymlemon
• synonymyellow
• neighborcowardly
• neighbordecoloured
• neighbordiscolored
• neighboricterus
• neighborjaundice
• neighborred
• neighbororange
• neighborgreen
• neighborblue
• neighborviolet
• neighborwhite
• neighborcolor